Prudently indeed and bravely was Joshua conducting the affair; yet Mars [the battle] alternated, and now the Israelites conquered, now the Amalekites. Of which thing Abulensis brings a double cause, but reckons the truer [one] to be this: that those whom Joshua had chosen for the fight were unfit — having, he says, trembling hearts, depressed with servile fear, and lacking strength, alien to all courage. Yet I cannot assent. For Moses would have commanded ridiculously [that] Joshua choose fit men, if there were none such; or certainly Joshua would not have done as Moses had spoken — contrary to what the text asserts (v. 10). But is everyone who is oppressed by another’s tyranny of a servile disposition? Is everyone timid, nerveless, and cowardly, whom another’s injury vexes? The Hebrews had been exercised in Egypt with hard and rustic labors — [were they] therefore timid…
(col. 73)
…[were they therefore] timid, effeminate, and unwarlike? “[The] braver [soldier],” says [Seneca] in the Epistles, “comes from rough ground”; and “from the fields,” says Vegetius (book 1, ch. 3), “the strength of the army seems chiefly to be supplied. For the rustic common folk — which is reared under the open sky and in labors — [is] fitter for arms.” It is the opinion of Cato (book 1 On Agriculture, ch. 1): “From farmers both the bravest men and the most strenuous soldiers are begotten.” Because, namely — as it is in Tacitus (book 6 of the Annals) — “they have grown more accustomed to hardness and endurance.” For me the cause which the text itself indicates is abundantly enough: “When Moses lifted up [his] hands, Israel conquered; but if he let [them] down a little, Amalek prevailed.” But the cause of this too can again be asked; yet let it be reserved for the following little question.